A collection of my recipes & food related thoughts…

Punjabi Chickpea Curry – CHANNA MASALA

Okay I’ll elaborate. The Hindu festival of “Navratri” takes place over the next nine days. It’s referred to by the elders as an “auspicious occasion” and one that symbolises the triumph of good over evil! It’s also a time where celebrations are expressed in the form of colour, family reunions, force feeding of Indian sweets by random aunties, dancing and eating (very possibly followed by more dancing and eating). Although the “eating” comes in the form of vegetarian food, it’s not really a problem for me as:

a) I’m not a huge carnivore anyway
b) I was a vegetarian for 3 of my teen years (I gave up when I moved to America-damn the USA with their tasty junk food that looks awful but tastes so darned good. I’m looking at you Mr pancakes topped with crispy bacon & maple syrup!
c) There is no shortage of delish Indian vegetarian dishes

It is slightly more of an issue for my other half however, as his dreams of kick-starting the week with Murgh Masala Monday & Tandoori Chicken Tuesday, sadly no longer exist. It is for this reason that I have decided to cook up some vegetarian dishes this week that deliver an extra portion of dishoom – hopefully easing the burn of the lack of “meatiness” in the kitchen.

Today’s recipe is spicy, filling, comforting and moreish – I don’t know how many more adjectives I need to list about this dish before it screams out MAKE ME! Enjoy and do let me know your thoughts. Oh and p.s . Happy National Curry Week!

Place chickpeas in a pressure cooker. Cover with water until the water level is 1 1/2" above the chickpeas. Add 1 tsp of salt and place lid on carefully. Cook for 12 minutes after the first whistle. Turn off heat. Allow to de-pressurise naturally before removing lid.

If you do not have a pressure cooker, place chickpeas with salt in a pan of water (same water level as above) and bring to boil. Now reduce the heat and allow to simmer until tender and cooked all the way through. This can take between 35-45 minutes. (If the water reduces before they have cooked, add more boiling water to the pan).

To make the masala, coarsely grind onions in a processor and place in a bowl. Now coarsely grind the chilli, ginger and garlic.

When they begin to splatter in the oil, add the ground onions. Add 1/2 tsp salt and cook for 4 minutes, stirring continuously.

When they turn slightly translucent, add the ground chilli, ginger and garlic mixture. Cook for 3-4 minutes until the masala turns completely golden.

Now reduce the heat and add the remaining salt, garam masala, paprika, turmeric and amchur powder and mix well. Now add the plum tomatoes and juice and mash into the masala. When the oil begins to separate from the masala, add the chickpeas and 1 cup of water and bring to boil and cook for 5-6 minutes on high heat.

Hi Monica,
I am trying this dish out now and I noticed that although you mention grinding chilli in the instructions you haven’t put chilli in the list of ingredients. So, what type of chilli and how many?

Apologies for the delay in replying and thanks for pointing this out! Both finger or birds eye green chillies work well in this dish. For this recipe you can use 1 whole chilli (you can obviously adjust this according to your personal hotness preference!)

hi michael. the darker color is due to the tea bags. you can omit adding the tea bags. sometimes even i don t add them. the taste would be slight different as tea flavors to add to the recipe. but not that the flavors change completely. the chole would be still delicious without adding the tea bags. the color of the chickpeas would be its natural creamish color and the color of the curry will be less darker.

Hi – I would advise that you need about 2tbsp of pre-cooked masala but of course it depends on how concentrated your masala paste is. It is always better to add a small amount and ix it with the chickpeas and then taste and adjust accordingly to your personal taste preference! 🙂

Hey I make Indian all the while at home…what is the specific ingredient which gives an authentic Punjabi taste….from the ingredients the only thing I haven’t added in my recipe is amchur…please can you let me know if it has a distinctive taste ?